Never miss out on a special teams improvement
As it always is with football, special teams is overshadowed by offense and defense. Beane said that Tyler Matakevich was the only guy he signed that he had little first-hand references on, but the tape didn’t lie. And there’s Taiwan Jones, who was previously on the Bills. The full special teams rundown:
“We just felt that special teams… is something that we weren’t good enough. We had improved the year before, but not good enough to be elite,” Beane said. “Bringing Taiwan back to help our coverage team… Macheovich, he’s just… a real ass kicker on special teams.”
The Bills brought in Heath Farwell to replace longtime special teams coordinator Danny Crossman last season.
Sports Illustrated’s Rick Gosselin, a highly-respected special teams analyst of 47 years conducts a review of the NFL’s 32 specialist units each season, rankings them 1-32.
In 2019, the Bills finished in the No. 12 spot with 341 total points. While outside the top-10, it’s a massive improvement from 2018, in Crossman’s final year as the Bills special teams coordinator, Buffalo was ranked second-last overall.